Record Rs 6 cr awarded in medical negligence case

SC directs AMRI, 3 doctors to pay sum to US-based Indian-origin doctor who lost his 29-year-old child psychologist wife during their visit to India in 1998

Don't want to miss the best from Business Standard?

In the highest compensation awarded in a medical negligence case, the Supreme Court on Thursday asked Kolkata-based Advanced Medicare and Research Institute (AMRI) Hospital and three doctors to pay Rs 5.96 crore, with interest, to a US-based Indian-origin doctor who lost his 29-year-old child psychologist wife during their visit to India in 1998.     

A bench of judges C K Prasad and V Gopala Gowda raised the compensation of Rs 1.73 crore, awarded by the National Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission (NCDRC) in 2011, to Rs 5.96 crore to Kunal Saha, an Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome researcher in Ohio. It asked AMRI and the doctors to pay the amount in eight weeks, with interest at six per cent from the date of filing of the case in 1999.

Terming the verdict “historic”, Saha, in an email from the US, said,"This will have a major impact on medical negligence and standard of medical care in India".     

"This will send a strong message to all negligent doctors and unscrupulous hospitals reaping innocent patients everyday across India."     

In May 2009, the apex court had awarded a record compensation of Rs 1 crore to wheelchair-bound Infosys engineer Prashant S Dhananka for medical negligence in a surgery by Hyderabad's Nizam Institute of Medical Sciences (NIMS) that damaged his spinal chord. He died in 2011.     

The court, in its common judgment, partly allowed the appeals of Saha, who had sought enhancement of compensation, and of Kolkata-based doctors Sukumar Mukherjee, Baidyanath N Halder and Balram Prasad.

NCDRC, in its judgment, had said AMRI and Mukherjee would pay Rs 40.4 lakh each to Saha, while two others  would pay Rs 26.93 lakh each to him.

The court, in its judgment, enhanced the amount to be paid by the hospital from Rs 40.4 lakh to Rs 5.83 crore.

It said of the total amount, Prasad and Mukherjee will pay Rs 10 lakh each and Halder Rs 5 lakh.     

One of the four treating doctors, Abani Roychowdhury, died during the pendency of case. The rest of the amount, with the interest, will be paid by the hospital, it said, adding a compliance report be filed before it after the payment.     

Saha’s wife Anuradha had come to her hometown Kolkata in March 1998 on a summer vacation. She had complained of skin rashes on April 25 and was treated by the doctors at AMRI. She died on May 28, 1998, allegedly due to an overdose of steroids.